Embattled Optus boss Kelly Bayer Rosmarin has pushed back against calls for compensation for individuals and businesses who suffered losses as a result of last week's massive outage.
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The Optus chief executive told a Senate inquiry that the carrier had so far provided $36,000 in assistance to those impacted by the breakdown and had received requests from 8500 customers worth around $430,000.
But Ms Bayer Rosmarin refused to specify how much it might provide, saying "I don't want to make any commitments on how much we're going to pay".
The carrier boss objected to describing such payments and its offer of 200Gb of data to subscribers as compensation.
"I don't like to use the word compensation," she said. "What we're doing is assessing this specific scenario ... and trying to do the right thing by the customer, who we want to have a long-term relationship with us."
The Optus head said part of the terms of service was an acknowledgement that outages can occur.
"We're providing our coverage on a best endeavours basis," she said. "We recognize that outages can occur. We work very hard to make sure that they don't, but they are provided on a best endeavours basis."
Pressed on the harm caused for thousands of customers, including businesses like cafes and service stations unable to process transactions, Ms Bayer Rosmarin acknowledged the inconvenience caused but said the question of compensation had far reaching implications.
![The company has said the outage was caused after an upgrade. Picture Shutterstock The company has said the outage was caused after an upgrade. Picture Shutterstock](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/rJkJNFPcdBkDQKqtkgHSjA/9a2b43ea-158f-41c5-aa5b-123f666fc829.jpg/r0_219_4288_2630_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
"There is no precedent for telcos or other essential providers covering consequential loss," she said. "We are very conscious that this would have far reaching implications not just for Optus, but not just for all telcos including the NBN, [but] also for other essential services, utilities, government services, and that this needs to be a much broader conversation than us unilaterally determining how to go about that."
Earlier, the inquiry was told that hundreds of triple zero calls did not go through on the day of the outage.
Ms Bayer Rosmarin told a Senate hearing that while most Optus customers were able to access the triple zero service, 228 triple zero calls "were unable to go through" during the breakdown.
The communications CEO said the company was still investigating why the connection to the triple zero service failed for some of its customers, adding it did not manage the system.
"We absolutely believe that the triple zero system should have worked and it's critical for all Australians that that system can be relied upon," she said.
Under fierce questioning from senators, Ms Bayer Rosmarin defended her company's handling of last Wednesday's massive outage which affected more than 10 million customers, including the information it provided to the public during the breakdown.
The Optus CEO has been heavily criticised for not appearing publicly during the early stages of the crisis, leaving Communications Minister Michelle Rowland to hold a series of media engagements with limited information.
While admitting that the telco could have "done some things better", Ms Bayer Rosmarin told a Senate hearing that her priority during the initial stages of the outage was to oversee the crisis response and ensure all resources were directed to restoring services.
She told the hearing the decision was made to delegate the task of informing the public to the communications team until it was determined that the outage was not as a result of a cyber attack.
"I wanted to ensure that, before I spoke, and given how little information we had about the cause and potential restoration time, that we could at least rule out the possibility of malicious activity to reassure our customers and the nation," Ms Bayer Rosmarin said.
"As soon as our cyber specialists ... ruled this out, I began publicly fronting the issue.
"I fully appreciate how frustrating it was for all our customers, not to know what the issue was or when it would be resolved.
"But that's not because we were withholding communicating. We ourselves did not know what the issue was and when it would be restored."
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Optus managing director of networks, Lambo Kanagaratnam, told the hearing that by 10.20am the technical team was "pretty confident" the breakdown had not been caused by a cyber attack.
Subsequently, the company has said the outage was caused after an upgrade on the Intel international peering network triggered its 90 Cisco routers to hit a failsafe mechanism and shutdown.
Mr Kanagaratnam said the telco had "multiple layers of redundancy" in its systems but the breakdown that occurred was unprecedented.
"Our defense mechanism did not work as it should have but the scale of the outage was obviously something that we didn't anticipate," he said.
Ms Bayer Rosmarin said the company was also reviewing its outsourcing arrangements in light of the outage.
"We do outsource a number of components of our network management to global leading companies," she said. "It is something that I do think we should look at as whether we have the right level of outsourcing and insourcing. It is something that has been on the minds of the team that we've already been thinking about."
Asked if she was considering resigning, Ms Bayer Rosmarin said she had not contemplated the idea.
"It has not been the time to be thinking about myself. My focus is on the team, customers and the company, not myself," she said.